A Boy and His Clones
by Pencyke
Summary: Jiraiya pushes Naruto off a cliff and, naturally, he's mad about it.


This is a what if one shot story based around the chuunin exam's final stage.

Also an important note is that I'm going off of the idea that when a shadow clone pops it's unused chakra returns to it's creator, effectively refilling their chakra pool and enabling them to create mass sets of the clones in rapid succession given that each set is destroyed before the next one is made.

* * *

"If you don't wish to die, do something about it. Now."

Naruto's eyes widened in horror as he caught a glimpse of the impossibly huge canyon he was suspended over. As gravity made known it's hold on the 12 year old's body, a thought ran through his head, _That bastard pushed me!_

Naruto screamed as he plummeted to his death, and he was sure he would die if he didn't do something.

With his life hanging in the balance, Naruto flared as much chakra as he could and brought his hands together. In another life, he might've tried to stick himself to one of the spikes jutting out from the wall, but there was no time for control in his mind. He would rely on the one technique that had saved his ass on so many occasions already. His signature move.

 **"SHADOW CLONE JUTSU!"**

Two clones poofed into existence alongside Naruto, falling alongside him. He screamed, "Really?! I give it my all and that's all I get? 2 clones?" Naruto gritted his teeth, he hadn't recovered anywhere near his full capacity while he'd been unconscious. His plan to make a clone bridge wouldn't work with only three of them. He'd have to think of something else, but what could he do? He could try for summoning a toad to help him but even after almost a month of training he'd only been able to get tadpoles and the like. There had to be something that could save him, there had to!

"Oi! Boss!" Naruto jolted out of his downward spiral of thoughts and looked over. The clone to Naruto's right shouted over the whistling air, "I have an idea!" It grinned from ear to ear, and the seconds ticked by as he waited for the clone to go on. It didn't.

Naruto wanted to hit the clone but settled for screaming at it, "Well don't wait for the moon to come out! Do it!"

"I thought you'd never ask!"

Smirking, that clone grabbed Naruto and the other clone by their clothes and threw them. Straight up. The clone smirked a bit more before dispersing itself. Naruto face palmed immediately after, "Why didn't I think of that?"

The other clone just shrugged as it latched onto the original's clothes and prepared for another toss, "Aren't we all the same guy anyway?" With that, the second clone launched him even further up, and this time he did latch onto one of the spikes sticking out of the wall. Clinging to the rock with both arms and legs, Naruto laid there. Eventually his heartbeat steadied and his breathing returned to normal and he played with the thought that he was alive. He was still so tired though, he'd climb back up once he had a little… more… rest…

* * *

Jiraiya stared down at his impromptu student and scratched at his cheek, "Well that was unexpected. Even after fainting from chakra exhaustion he was still able to recover enough for a couple of shadow clones." The old man shook his head, Naruto really did pick the worst times to do the impossible. He'd completely missed the whole point of being in a life or death situation and because of that, the kid still had no idea how to summon toads or call on the Nine Tail's chakra. Looking on the bright side, at least the kid had a new trick to do with his shadow clones, but he could've figured that out on his own time anyway so it seemed more like a waste of time than anything else. Jiraiya groaned as he sat down and pulled out the transcript for his latest book, "Might as well let the brat rest a little bit."

* * *

When Naruto finally did pull himself over the edge of the cliff, the moon was out and Jiraiya was right there waiting for him. Neither spoke until the 12 year old in orange finished brushing off as much dust and moisture as he could.

"I'm done." Naruto's voice was quiet, something that Jiraiya picked up on. Even in the short time that he'd known the kid, Naruto was never quiet in anything that he did.

"You haven't summon a toad yet. You aren't done until you do that," Jiraiya lifted his large form from his lounging position on the grass with an air of finality. Then, as if it were an afterthought, he added, "And when you consciously access the Nine Tail's chakra." He turned to leave.

"I'm not stupid."

Jiraiya scratched his head, what else did the kid have to say? "Are you sure about that? I'm pretty sure that the world would disagree with you on that."

"I'm _not_ stupid." This time, the blond put a little more force into his voice, willing Jiraiya to listen, "I know enough not to train under someone who tried to kill me."

Jiraiya turned back around, a placating smile haphazardly placed on his face, "Now wait just a minute. I had everything under control, if it looked like you weren't gonna be able to do it then I would've gone down and saved you. You weren't in any danger, the bottom is way farther down than the few hundred meters that you fell."

Naruto threw up his hands in disgust, "That's even worse! You wouldn't even care if I happened to die on accident!"

Jiraiya cringed slightly at that one, "Don't you think that's a little harsh?"

"Harsh?! You tossed me off a cliff and you think a few words is harsh?!" Naruto took a deep breath before he spoke again, with a soft voice once more, "I'm done with you." He brushed past the mountain of a man, heading in the direction of the village, "You can go ahead and erase my name from that summoning contract. Wouldn't have done me any good anyway."

Jiraiya watched Naruto walk away, and he let him. In that moment Jiraiya felt far older than he ever had before, his shoulders sagged and he just stood there and stared at the trees.

"Minato, I'm sorry."

* * *

Naruto spent what little time he had left before the final stage of the chunin exam training in everything that he knew with his shadow clones, which ended up being pitifully little. He could count his entire arsenal of ninjutsu on one hand. Even if he did have a taijutsu master at his disposal, Lee had been at it for an entire year and still hadn't beat that Neji guy even once, so that was out. Even if Naruto was physically able to perform genjutsu Neji would've seen right through it anyway with his Byakugan. As hopeless as it seemed Naruto didn't give up, nor did he go crawling back to Jiraiya for help.

When it came time for the last part of the exam to start, he glared defiantly at the opponent who he'd sworn to beat. He grit his teeth and he glared when Neji had started with the verbal abuse but Naruto said nothing in response to the jabs and jibes against him. He just kept on making more and more shadow clones. More each time until they filled the arena with a sea of orange and blonde. Each one with the very same look of still determination and quiet defiance.

When Neji tore into the ranks of his clones and launched into the story of his own life Naruto just scowled a little harder. Eventually Neji had killed all of his clones and Naruto stood across from the other boy, now panting from exertion. As Naruto raised his hands once more in their crossed shape Neji growled and rushed the brightly colored boy, calling out numbers as he struck out at Naruto with increasing speed. Even as Neji tried his damnedest to close all of Naruto's tenketsu, he maintained his cross shaped hand sign popping clones into existence directly in front of him just in time to take Neji's hits and allow him to dodge away.

Naruto created even more shadow clones as he ran up the side of the stadium wall, for every one that Neji killed there were already three running up to join the fray. Neji was swamped with shadow clones, too many to move through so he spun and eradicated all of the clones in his personal space with tearing chakra. But just as came out of his spin, another clone burst out of the ground and nailed him with an uppercut straight to the face that lifted Neji into the air, just in time to meet the bottom of Naruto's sandal, sending him crashing back into the ground, unconscious.

The crowd was silent as the proctor checked Neji's pulse, but when Naruto was declared the winner they went wild. His scowl lightened up a bit as he sat back to wait for Sasuke to arrive.

* * *

Naruto scowled as he exploded Gaara's backside. He scowled when the kid turned into a giant beast and he scowled as he broke out of a sand coffin with his shadow clones. Naruto scowled as he and a couple thousand shadow clones all wrapped a kunai with an explosive tag each and threw them in tandem.

The explosion was glorious. The light of it illuminated the land like a miniature sun and the wind it generated was felt from miles around.

Naruto sat down on the tree branch he was occupying to rest, he'd used too many shadow clones that day. Sakura had been released from her sandy prison, he'd blown Gaara to smithereens, twice, and Sasuke was off somewhere whining to himself. Naruto felt content to close his eyes, it had been a long day.


End file.
